


Strawberry Sunday

by Waldo



Category: Torchwood
Genre: Community: HorizonsSing, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Illness, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-07-08
Updated: 2008-07-08
Packaged: 2017-10-05 01:01:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,172
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/36030
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Waldo/pseuds/Waldo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Only you could follow the statement 'it was fatal' with 'so now I'm fine.'"</p>
            </blockquote>





	Strawberry Sunday

**Author's Note:**

>   Written for the [](http://www.livejournal.com/users/horizonssing/profile)[**horizonssing**](http://www.livejournal.com/users/horizonssing/) [Day 8 Challenge,](http://community.livejournal.com/horizonssing/3429.html) which was a picture of a strawberry.  Also, maybe I'm strange, but when I'm sick I crave fresh fruit like nothing else.  Usually grapes, grapefruit or strawberries.  Probably has something to do with Vitamin C.

Jack let himself in with the spare key Ianto had given him an age ago. He checked the kitchen and the sitting room before finding Ianto curled up in a little ball under the quilt in the bedroom.

He shook his head fondly before setting the small bag of groceries on the dresser and sitting down on the edge of the bed. He pulled the blankets down from around Ianto's head and was rewarded with a lethal glower.

He brushed Ianto's hair off his forehead. "Martha says not to let you do that," he said as he pulled the quilt back, but left Ianto the sheet. "You were at almost thirty-eight degrees when you left this morning. You need to stay cool."

"Bugger'ff" Ianto mumbled into the pillow, not opening his eyes and fishing around blindly for the edge of the quilt. "Where's my blanket?" he asked exasperatedly when he couldn't find it.

"On the floor. No, seriously, Martha said –"

"Bugger Martha and bugger you. This is your fault anyway. Give me my duvet." Ianto still didn't risk aggravating his headache by opening his eyes.

"You better not be buggering Martha," Jack said leaning down to kiss Ianto's sweaty forehead. "Buggering me, however, is completely open for negotiation." Jack lifted up the edge of the sheet and peered down. "If you think you're up for it."

"Jack!" Ianto finally exploded. He wanted to sleep, and he wanted his blanket and he wanted Jack to shut the fuck up.

Jack chuckled and kissed Ianto's cheek. "Sorry. It was just so easy… Anyway, Martha sent me with some ibuprofin that has a milligram count that looks like a phone number, some juice and she told me to get you grapes. But I know you aren't keen on grapes when you're sick." Jack settled on the floor so he'd be close to eye-level with Ianto.

"They were all my mam would give me when I was sick as a kid. They always make me think of having the flu." Ianto grumbled.

"You do have the flu. The space-flu as Gwen keeps calling it. But anyway, I got you strawberries from that little market down the street from here. I didn't even realize they were open on the weekends."

Ianto cracked open one eye. "You got me strawberries?"

Jack smiled at the way Ianto instantly dissolved into a six-year-old when promised his favorite treat. "I did. So take your pills like a good boy – and leave the quilt on the floor –" he admonished when it looked like Ianto might be reaching for it "and I'll get them for you," Jack finished.

Jack helped him sit up and handed him the prescribed medication and a glass of orange juice. Ianto grimaced as the pills went down funny.

"How is Gwen?" Ianto asked, staying upright to finish the juice.

"I called Rhys on my way over here. Apparently she's almost as big a baby as you are. I could hear her yelling in the background that she wanted her toast."

"It's all your fault for opening that damn canister," Ianto grumbled as he handed the empty glass back to Jack and flopped back against the pillow. "Speaking of which, how'd you manage not to get sick? That microbe dust went right in your face."

"Yes, now you can say that I literally make you sick," Jack deadpanned. "Besides, I was sick for a bit. And… then I got better." Jack stood up to put the glass down and began fidgeting in the grocery sack.

"How did you 'get better'? Martha seems to think we're going to be miserable for a while." Ianto was alternately glaring at Jack and looking longingly at the quilt, clearly debating the chance he had of getting it back before Jack could stop him.

"Well, yeah, _you_ are; I'm… not." Jack knew that Ianto would be pissed if he explained how it was that he wasn't sick any more.

"So… what? You had some kind of medicine chucked in from the rift that you took? There wasn't enough for the rest of us?" Ianto's eyes started drifting back shut.

"No. If I had something like that, I would have shared." Jack rearranged the sheet over Ianto and sat on the edge of the bed, gently rubbing circles over Ianto's back.

"Jack…" Ianto growled, at the end of his patience.

Jack rolled his eyes, knowing that he was in for a lashing, but also knowing that the longer he put it off, the worse that lashing would be. "I… died."

Ianto shot back up. "JACK!"

Jack put a calming hand on his shoulder. "Not on purpose. I didn't eat my gun or anything." Even though he knew Jack would come back, Ianto had always been agitated whenever Jack died and Jack knew it. "Like you said, that canister went off right in my face. Apparently in that strong a concentration, it's fatal. So… now I'm fine."

"Only you could follow the statement 'it was fatal' with 'so now I'm fine.'" Ianto shook his head, immediately thinking better of it when it started to pound in time with his pulse. "Ow."

Jack helped him get settled against his pillows again, stroking his hair and whispering, "Shh…" as Ianto brought his hands up to his temples.

"I'm okay, now," Jack said. "And Martha says the air scrubbers in the hub have neutralized the rest of the microbes. So now we just need you and Gwen to finish killing off the rest of them."

"Is that what we're doing?" Ianto wondered, relaxing into Jack's tender minstrations. "I thought we were just laying in bed and being miserable."

"Nope," Jack said cheerfully, as he bent down to untie his boots and kick them off. "You're doing very important Torchwood work, killing off some nasty little alien microbes."

"Lucky us," Ianto mumbled into his pillow.

Jack stretched out along Ianto's back and Ianto pressed into his heat gratefully. "How long does Martha figure we're going to be out of commission?"

"A few days. Maybe a week." Jack pulled the handheld rift monitor from his pocket. "I figured that if Rhys was going to take care of Gwen, the least I could do was come over here and see if you needed anything."

Letting go of his earlier pique, Ianto sighed. "Just you, if you don't need to run off anytime soon."

Jack kissed the back of Ianto's head. "Nope. I think we have things battened down for the duration. If anything comes up, I'll know." He waved the handheld again. "So get some sleep. I'll be right here."

Ianto shuffled over onto his other side and buried his face in Jack's shoulder. "And when I get up, we can have the strawberries?"

Jack laughed. He might never know why Ianto got such a charge out of a simple fruit that wasn't hard to come by or even ridiculously expensive. "Sure. But for now, get some sleep."

Ianto snuggled in even closer, clutching the sheet around his still shivering body. "Mm-kay."

 


End file.
